At P&G we are particularly bad at doing this and often laugh that foreigners that learn english at P&G don’t really learn proper english. As a native english speaker, it is even more annoying for me when I forget the right way to say something or finding myself defying spell checker over MADE UP WORDS… the one below is my biggest annoyance.

Welcome Unsuck it.com… the sites that translate annoying business speak into normal English and even gives you the option to ‘email the douchebag who used it’ . Simply inspired. Unfortunately for us P&G-ers it doesn’t have a grasp on our endless 3 letter acronym speak… but this is a crowd-sourced app so who knows in the future!

So yes, I work at Procter & Gamble… a company that should be at the forefront of digital marketing given its brands, size, money and amazing staff… but its not…no big secret for anyone inside or outside the company… but we are getting there!

But today my company put a massive Web 2.0 smile on my face that I’d thought I’d share to give an insider example of how social media is being used within a company to learn more about the consumer & interact more with him/her and each other at a level never before possible.

So today, P&G Marketing internally launched an upgrade of its internal marketing site…and in one fail swoop installed all the web 2.0 social media tools that I could ever want to connect better with the consumer, and also with my own P&G colleagues (all 180,000 around the world) – some of which are marketing geniuses.

I was given the option to choose 12 boxes to go on my homepage and was able to select items such as a Twitter feed of my brand (Max Factor) , a You Tube feed of my category (Cosmetics) and links to what I can only describe as internal twitter-ish profiles and groups (similar to Brazen Careerist) which populated in seconds with members joining from all over the world to start discussing marketing trends, brand news and share and reapply items through the forums and streams. Also, we all have our own blogs to post what we want to share with the P&G community.

I find this so exciting because I know that within P&G I am with very good company in terms of expertise in marketing and brand building and therefore can’t wait to read what all the employees are posting and talking about etc…. It is also so exciting to have a twitter/you tube feed constantly of my consumer… although I already had this myself, I think it is awesome that now Gen X + will have this streaming to their screens every day.

Anyway, I love it and all I can hope is that it gives me not only inspiration in my daily work but also for my blogging too…. so Thank You to my 170 year old company for thinking of Gen Y and absorbing social media.

• I find out peoples values and what is important to them so that I can work with them well and essentially get from them what I need when I need it
• I am selling people a product that they don’t necessarily need (especially in my fragrance days) but I make them think that they need it
• I am persuading trade to take my product as it will bring them great returns and increase their customer base – I am also getting them to give me more space at the same time as I can persuade with my consumer data that my product is the next best thing
• I am getting the creative at the agency to ignore his creative juices and move in my direction as I pay the bill and can cut the funding…

It doesn’t make me comfortable….but where is the line between marketing and manipulating?

Today I celebrate my move to Marketing and Cosmetics Brand Management…woop woop.

It is almost 1 year to the day that I decided to make this career change and I can barely believe that I am now living it – it has been theoretical for so long.

Making this career change has given me the confidence that anything is possible if you are determined and passionate. It is not easy to change ‘function’ within my company and it involves being re-interviewed and put back to day 1 in a promote from within company. It also involves a lot of negotiation and people trying to change your mind. My great timing of trying to move in a recession was also not my greatest idea as I theoretically put my hand up for redundancy…luckily it did not come to that!

With all the odds stacked against me, I look back to learn what is was that got me though and I single it down to a lot of passion. Simple.

I could write my current marketing knowledge on the back of a postage stamp – that did not get me through. I am a team player and a leader but so are all my peers – that did not get me through. I am good at networking (still not as good as I thought) and get on well with people but so are my friends and network – that did not get me through.

So it must have been my passion. In a competitive environment when you are competing against the best you need to find something that sets you apart. If driven by passion (with a lot of determination) anything is possible. Passion propels you over all barriers and gives you the guts to give it a go – whatever it is.

If I was not passionate about Beauty Marketing – I would not have asked to move, I would not have argued against my adversaries that thought ‘they knew best’, I would not have persuaded my interviewers that I was worth the risk, I would not have persuaded my new boss to trust me with his business. Finally, I might not have had the perseverance to keep battling for 1 year to get what I want.

So here I am – this is what I have learnt so far – I hope that you find it useful…

And here goes – I am about to embark on a HUGE learning curve…wish me luck!!

This is a realisation that I had last week when I attended a seminar at work on Friday given by the Girl’s Guide to Business… it was quite simple but it came as a surprise to me. I always thought I was good at it! I wanted to share in case it strikes a tone with anyone else…

I have a lot of friends, in fact 943 of them on Facebook (yes I know them all personally), and I get on well with 90% of people that I work with – I always thought that this meant that I am naturally a good networker but after listening to the wise words of Caitlin and Kim I realise that when it comes to networking I fall into the same trap that many women do.

Women are allegedly natural networkers but despite the fact that we speak 20,000 words a day opposed to the 7,000 of men, the men still have bigger networks. After listening to the girls, I realise that this discrepancy lies in our inability to separate a social event to a networking opportunity whereas men treat networking as a science.

Most of my network is built up of people that I have got to know over a period of time or a series of occasions. I have left many events thinking how nice all the people where, how funny they were and how pleasant my evening was but I rarely leave somewhere with new connections made just on that night. If there is someone that interests me I just hope that they remember me next time that they see me. Apparently this is where I am going wrong, although I think I am a good networker – I am rubbish.

Another reason why I as a woman am a terrible networker is because I suffer from “impostor syndrome” – common in a lot of women. Suffering from impostor syndrome means that you feel like “I don’t really know what I am doing” or “I’ll fake it until I get caught” and in terms of networking – “why would they want to meet me” and “why would they want to network with me – what do I have to give”. Men don’t seem to experience this in the same extent as women and to be honest, no woman should suffer it…it is for the others to decide, not you.

I am sharing this realisation in myself as it surprised me. I was so sure that I had networking skills “ticked off” as one of my strengths but the way they put it made me realise I was so wrong. I now know that I need to learn a little from men in this circumstance and treat networking as a more conscious activity – not as far as being a science- but need to make sure that I am making connections when it counts and not just having a good time.